Manitoba agrees to send Winnipeg's funding ask for North End sewage plant upgrades, transit plan to feds

The province of Manitoba has agreed to forward the City of Winnipeg's application for federal funding on two key projects,the premier and mayor said at a news conference on Wednesday.

That includes the second phase of upgrades to Winnipeg'sNorth End sewage treatment plant, whichinvolves the construction of a $552-million facility to process biosolidsa sludgy byproduct of the initial treatment of solid human waste.

A funding request for the city'smaster plan to overhaul Winnipeg Transit with a series of capital projects estimated to cost $538.9 million will also be passed on toOttawa, Premier Heather Stefanson and Mayor Brian Bowman announced at Winnipeg's city hall.

The transit projects include abus radio and intelligent transportation systems project, the replacement of the North End garage anda transition to zero-emission buses.

The preliminary design of rapid transit downtown corridors, primary transit network infrastructure and wheelchair securement retrofitting are also part of that request for money.

The funding the city is applying for comes from the federal government's Investing in Canada Infrastructure Program. Because federal funding can't flow directly to a municipality, the province needed to agree to advance Winnipeg's application for cash to Ottawa.

Request was delayed

The city has been undertaking a massive upgrade of its sewage treatment system tomeet the requirements of its licence under theprovince's Environment Actand reduce the outflow ofnutrients into Lake Winnipeg.

Bowman said the work has taken too long.

"I think everybody thatcares about the health of our rivers and lakes would have liked to have seen much of this dealt with byprevious administrations, both here at the city and at the provincial level, of different political stripes," he said.

"Previous mayors and council, in my view, didn't move as quick as I would've liked."

The second phase of upgrades to the North End plant is just part of a multi-phase series of critical upgrades to the pollution control centre, which the city estimates will cost $1.8 billion in total.

The request for federal fundingwas held up earlier this year, when the province asked the city to explore using a public-private partnership (P3) model to expand and operate the plant instead of forwarding Winnipeg's request for funding.

Moira Geer, director of the city's water and waste department, said at the time that using that type of model for Winnipeg's largest and oldest sewage treatment plant would effectively take control of the entire system out of the city's hands.

That's because the city's treatment plants work in tandem and any public-private partnership could run as long as 30 years, Geer said.

On Wednesday, Stefanson and Bowman said discussions on that topic will continue, but neither saw anyreason to delay the request to the federal government.

City council's executive policy committee had already made a motion to call on the province to immediately submit the city's funding request to Ottawa which Wednesday's announcement accomplishes, Bowman said.

"It's going to make for less fireworks on the floor of council tomorrow, which is a good thing in politics," he said.

"We're actually being able to demonstrate that we can work together."

Meanwhile, apublic-private partnership market sounding reportthe province requested is now complete and will be presented to city council on Thursday, Bowman said.

The funding request will still need to be reviewed by the federal government after it's officially submitted, but the update is still a cause for celebration, he said.

"To have these two critical infrastructure projects move forward in such a short period of time is a credit to [Stefanson] and her leadership," Bowman said alongside the new premier, who was sworn in about three weeks ago.

It was a kind of joint news conference that both leaders suggested would have been uncommonunder Stefanson's predecessor, Brian Pallister.

"Manitobans rightly expect the leaders of the province and the largest community to stand together to solve problems and build a place for all of us to be proud of," Stefanson said.

"We want to make sure that we move forward together and send a signal to the federal government that these issues are of great importance, not just to the city of Winnipeg but to all Manitobans."

NDP raises privatization concern

Manitoba's Official Opposition took issue with the announcement,saying it leaves the door open for privatizing water services, a water rate hike and sending jobs out of province.

"Premier Stefanson refused to rule out a private model today, proving she isn't that different from Brian Pallister after all," NDPenvironment criticLisa Naylor said in a news release.

Stefanson needs to give Winnipeg workers an answer on whether she "will she send their jobs out of province" or "fight for working families," Naylor's statement said.

Stefanson said those conversations are still ongoing.